A Cold Night

A Chapter by GoodStuff

Chapter 1 of a story that I have almost no idea where its going.

I stand, staring, into the cold rainy night. The raindrops bounce over the frozen puddles scattered across the broken white stone of the street. To my right, a floating glass orb illuminates the night. There is no moon. There are no stares. I feel my breath freeze as it leaves my mouth. Its warmth blows off into the wall of darkness surrounding of me. Now the breeze blows harder and the rain falls faster, and I pull the hood of my coat further over my face.

But through the cold and the rain, another presence reaches my awareness. It does not physically impose on me, but instead exists only because I know it to exist. I look out, towards it, into the darkness in wait of its arrival--for gradually it approaches at a steady walking pace. Finally; a shaded figure appears.

“Hello,” his deep raspy voice announces. The cool air steals the warmth from his greeting.

In reply I give a slight nod, keeping my eyes fixed on his figure. He is cloaked, much as myself, in a thick dark overcoat. The street light illuminates his worn face under his hood"with dark eye sockets, heavy brows, sunken cheeks, pale blue eyes. All are plagued with age.

“I don’t believe we have much to say tonight,” his voice continues, his words spilling into the night. “Everything is in the package.”

Looking down, I watch as withered hand extends a grey envelope out to me. It is sealed with black wax, stamped with the imprint of a hand. A few drops of rain land the opportunity of hitting its course paper before I have the envelope safely tucked deep inside my coat.

Then, looking up, I see the man’s slim silhouette fade into the darkness. I take a deep breathe of the cold, heavy air before turning away as well.

***

It’s morning. I wake to the dim light of dawn trickling through the lone small window pressed high into the wall across from me. Rolling out of the forgiving warmth of my bed I place my feet on the cold stone floor of the small dank room. The bed creaks loudly.

After igniting a fire in a small shabby stove, I sit at a table and eat a dry starch bar in enjoyment of the stove’s feeble warmth. In front of me is the envelope, with its black seal glistening from the fire’s light. Finishing my breakfast I tear off this seal and draw out the contents. For a few minutes my eyes follow the typed print of the coarse paper.

After reading most of the content, my gaze drifts off. I stare blankly into the rising flames of the fireplace. For a moment I let the letter escape my mind, but eventually my thoughts drift back and I lean over to the stove. For a time I hold the paper over the dancing tongues of the fire; but then I let go. The letter leaves my hand and falls--floating down, catching aflame and withering away.

Standing, I move a large ebony trunk sitting firmly at the edge of my bed. The wooden sides show age, but are firmly held together by a cast iron frame. I kneel and lift the lid, the hinges creaking loudly, and I reach in to retrieve its contents. A dark cloak"still damp from the prior night--I throw around me. I then stamp my feet into a pair of heavy boots. Then the trunk closes and I turn to the door. As I leave, the fire presses itself out.

In the narrow corridor it is dark: pitch black. Six, seven, eight steps, I reach out and find the iron ladder bolted to the wall. Three, four, five steps up and I stop and reach up with my hand. I touch wood, and then give a large upward shove. Bam! The trapdoor swings open, the slam reverberating in the room above. I step out. My eyes adjust and the usual surroundings come into focus.

It’s a church. The small room holds roughly twenty or so pews, facing the raised platform on which I stand. All are basked in an array of soft colored light: blues, yellows, reds. I turn and look up at the looming colored glass window from which the light comes. A giant cross also looms over and above, casting a shadow across the room.

The atmosphere could be described as unreal, if not for the soot. In a thick, grey layer it covers the broken pews and the tiled stone floor. It would cover the altar, too, if there was one. Whatever altar that may have existed is gone, exposing the probably once-hidden trap door. Then at the back of the church, the great oak doors are boarded over. Entrance to the church would be impossible if not for a crumbling corner.

After descending the stone steps of the raised platform, I pace down the center aisle. Arbitrarily I select a pew and sit, the shade of the cross over me. The bench gives a weak groan as I settle. Then silence. Pure silence. The sun rises through the colored glass and colors dance more vividly across the room. It’s uncanny that the only untouched magnificence left of the dilapidated church is the great oak cross and the colorful stained glass window behind it. Then the thought occurs to me how a place that once held countless firm believes, now holds a single disbeliever.

Hah, religion.

I stand and make my way through the crumbling corner into an alley. Trash is shoved to one side or the other. A few cardboard boxes are here, a broken chair there, some old rags. A cold, motionless pair of feet peek out from under one piece of cardboard. I walk down this ally until I emerge out of its shadow and into a narrow street, flooded with a cool morning breeze. The breeze fills my cloak as I turn and begin my walk over its broken white stone.

With the old church behind me, to my left and right I pass a jumble of small steel structures, shoved up side by side, and haphazardly built one on top of another. Un-homely doorsteps and dark windows face the street. These are Homes; and Splitting through them is the narrow street that I walk.

In the street walk a fair amount of pedestrians, their attire consisting mostly plain clothing in various dull shades of grey. They walk one way or another, for their blue collar or white collar jobs. Overall it’s fairly quiet, but this changes when after a few blocks I turn left down a wide boulevard. Here, a mass of people crowd the street. Most houses are gone, replaced by various commercial businesses. As I jostle through the crowd, I pass my favorite pub, The Greyer. Its fluorescent blue neon sign hangs above a dark doorway. Next to it lies a an open garage repair shop, and after that, a laser skin marking studio. The largest complex, a store titled All Cosmopolitan, faces the street with a huge sheet of glass, stretching several stories up and maybe 50 yards or so across. Towering shelves of inventory can be seen within.

Then below me rambles a light mechanical hum from the street. If I were to stand still long enough, I would feel its vibrations as well. Then from above me comes an irregular whrring sound, coming from a multitude of sleek objects flying by. Skimming by at such high speeds, all the eye picks up are small white blurs. Depending on the amount of skimmers, the magnetic vibrations in the street strengthen and weaken.

Eventually I veer off from the crowd and turn down a narrower street. Here the streets are much less crowed, and I escape the headache of so many people. Now all there is to do is walk. It’s a long walk, and it is early afternoon when I arrive at my destination.

***

Thud. Thud. Thud.

I pound my fist on the smooth steel door before me. The house it belongs to is slightly larger than most the other houses around. Most the afternoon I’ve been observing it, stooping against a complex on the other side of the street, waiting for day to grow dark. Now I stand on the building’s doorstep, illuminated only by a thin sliver of a moon in a clear night sky. There are no rainclouds, but a cold wind blows hard. Then suddenly the door slides open. A slight man stands just beyond the doorframe. He has curly hair, glasses, and a hand posted on the door frame.

“Good evening,” I say, with a smile. “Cold night, huh?”

The man frowns. “Excuse me, sir, but do I know you?”

“No. You do not,” I reply. The man stares, continuing his frown, so I repeat, commenting again, “It is a cold night though. Do you mind if I come in?”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I do not know you, and I’m going to go bed. Good night.” The man then turns to close the door.

“Dr. Hayart, “ I say, in all seriousness, “I said that it is cold outside.” At this the man stops. Slowly he turns back around to face me. His face is blank, the frown gone, but only for a moment. A smile soon lights up, erasing any awkwardness.

His mouth then opens to speak, “Your right. It is a cold night. Would you like to come in?”

I return his smile. “Yes. I would,” I reply, stepping in and passing the man’s stiff stature. Entering the central room of the house, I take a seat on a rather hard but warm black chair. Looking around, I notice that most of the furniture is black, the floor tiles as well, though the steel walls have been painted white. Overall the room is simple and plain. On the table beside me is a picture of a woman, smiling. From what I read, this is most likely the man’s deceased wife.

“Please, have some water.” The man enters the room with a bottle.

I reach out to grab the bottle. “You have a beautiful wife,” I comment, after a few sips.

The man takes a seat on the chair across from me. “Yes, thank you,” he says, turning his gaze to the photo. After a sigh, he says with a rather straight face, “She died several years ago. Killed, I still argue…” I watch him as he continues to examine the picture. “And you, are you married?”

“No.” I pause before saying, “I can’t.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” the man replies. “Though I must ask, do you mean to say that you can’t, or you don’t want to?”

“Can’t. Follows the Job.”

The beginnings of a frown tweak the corners of the man’s mouth. “Well, can I can I ask what job that may be?”

“No,” I say, keeping a straight face. “But you… you write for the Daily Express.”

“Why, yes I do,” he says with a hint of pride.

“Yes,” I continue, “You write for the Daily Express, about the growth of crime in the lower districts. Your argumentation for the increase in action against organized crime is very well respected. Too respected.”

The man suddenly stands up, his face in a frown of surprise and fear.

“Hey, sit down!” To this the man sits without second thought. “Your wife’s work was good as well. It’s unfortunate that you had to assume her line of work after she was killed.”

The man attempts to stand up again, shifting his weight around in his chair, though he fails to part his arms and legs from the chair. Realizing that his situation is rather helpless, he stops moving. “Who the hell are you!”

I lean back in the chair and rest my boots on the glass table in front of me. “Like I saying before, I can’t tell you my job but I’ll give you a hint--I have to stop you from doing yours.”

Realizing what the situation might be coming to for him, the man again attempts to stand up--with much more force and urgency than before. Although still it is futile.

“Ah, sit still. It’s no use trying to run away.” I thought my words wouldn’t have any effect on the man, but I was wrong. He stops and looks at me with a helpless look of fear on his face. “I’ll just get to the point,” I inform him. “We have before us two choices. The first of which, you may probably prefer. This choice is that you simply abandon your career, and give me your word that you will not mention this meeting to another soul.”

The man only continues to sit, looking on at me with sad, begging eyes.

“Unfortunately, what will most likely occur if we do choose to follow this plan is that you will eventually fail to uphold your part of the deal, and I will find myself with a fair amount of more work. So that is why I will choose for you the second choice. You’re a smart man. You can probably guess what it is.”

“Please… don’t,” mumbles the man.

But it is too late. From my seat, I fix a grip on the man’s last pleading thoughts, racing around his mind at abnormally high rates. I bring them together, squeezing hard. Across from me the man winces in pain, the muscles in his neck standing out. He does not cry out, taking his suffering in a death quiet house. Eventually the thoughts stop. They break apart, and I release my hold. The man slumps in his seat and his head falls loosely back.

I stand to leave, and begin my walk to the door, but I realize that my job is not yet done. There is someone in the room above. I climb a sleek black staircase to the second level and walk down a narrow hallway, taking the second door to my left. It’s a bedroom. The room is dark, except for the small stars dancing across the ceiling. Lying in the bed is a boy, oblivious to the occurrences below. His serene face reflects that of the darkness around him. I stand for a moment, then another. The boy is dreaming about his mother. I stand for another moment, then don my hood and turn to leave.

***

The Greyer is in its usual dark shade of grey, with its lack of decent lighting. The place is quite large, though the low ceiling gives the place a small, cramped feeling. Scattered about are much of the habitual faces. Taking my usual spot at the bar, I nod to a man wiping glasses"Joe.

Joe is the owner of the pub. He’s a tall thick man, though his strength stops after his broad shoulders. Above that, a skinny neck holds up small shaved round head.

“I’ll take the usual, thanks.”

“No problem.” Joe makes up the drink, and places the glass on the counter in front of me. He sets the glass down, and I eye the dark marks on his forearm. As I watch, a thorny vine twists about, wrapped around his bulky forearm.

I then pick the glass up off the counter take a deep swig, the warm liquid burning slightly as it goes down. Immediately I enjoy a warm and relaxed sensation.

Joe speaks up: “You keep coming back and drinkin’ that stuff as often as you do, you’ll be regretting it soon.”

I give a slight grin. “No, I’m not too worried about that.” Joe chuckles a bit at this and goes back to wiping glasses.

Turning to the girl a few seats to my right, who had turned an ear towards my conversation, I give a little further explanation: “And no, I’m not dying,” I tell her. The girl turns away, startled, as if her thoughts had been pulled right off the top of her head.

When the drink is gone, I blurt out, “Hey Joe, I have a question for you.” Joe continues to wipe glasses, but looks up for a moment to acknowledge me. “What’s the favorite part about your job?” I inquire.

Joe keeps quite for a mement, shrugs, then declares in all seriousness, “Well there’s free drinks.” I smile a bit at this, but Joe finds this quite funny and lets loose another chuckle. But I wait, and eventually he continues, “No, I do it for the people. They interest me.”

“Yeah, I agree,” I say, “They’re interesting all right.”

He looks up at me. “Some more than others,” he states, with a wide grin.

I think about what Joe had said for a while; then, realizing the time, I make my way back out to the cold night.

***

It’s dark, as I stand in the same spot as the night before. The wind is still blowing, and the moon has remained unhidden by clouds. Right on time, the old man steps out from the gloom into the light. He looks content. Speaking up, his rough hoarse voice breaks the silence. “Another job well done, my boy.” He reaches out to give a hard pat to my shoulder. “Quick and easy.”

My eyes wonder off into the dark. “Yes, well, there was only the one man.”

“I suppose so…” he replies.

We stand for a moment in silence.

Then the old man says, with a straight face, “You know, you’ve proven yourself a valuable asset the society. I’m pulling you in to the center district.”

This takes me back a step. I didn’t see this coming. Of all the thoughts I feel flying around; those of the old man always eluded me.